The Court of International Trade in a confidential decision June 13 sustained CBP's negative evasion finding regarding Dominican company Kingtom Aluminio. Enforce and Protect Act petitioner Aluminum Extrusions Fair Trade Committee brought suit, arguing that CBP's Office of Regulations and Rulings wrongly overturned an evasion finding initially made by CBP's Trade Remedy and Law Enforcement Directorate (see 2309220032). The petitioner claimed that TRLED was right to use adverse inferences against Kingtom after the company interfered with CBP's ability to verify information submitted by the company. The court hasn't given any indication of when it will make the decision public (Aluminum Extrusions Fair Trade Committee v. U.S., CIT # 22-00236).
Importer Diamond Tools Technology voluntarily dismissed its appeal of an Enforce and Protect Act case on diamond sawblades at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. The importer took to the appellate court after its application for attorney's fees was rejected by the Court of International Trade (see 2307310021) (Diamond Tools Technology v. U.S., Fed. Cir. # 24-1882).
The Court of International Trade on June 10 signaled that CBP's practice of not notifying companies when they become subject to interim Enforce and Protect Act investigations could give rise to a due process claim should the company sufficiently allege that it suffered "specific enough harm." However, the court found that importer Phoenix Metal failed to allege that harm with enough specificity.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in a June 7 order affirmed the Court of International Trade's decision to sustain the Commerce Department's use of antidumping duty respondent Z.A. Sea Food's (ZASF's) Vietnamese sales to calculate normal value in an AD review on Indian frozen warmwater shrimp. The unanimous order from Judges Alan Lourie, Raymond Clevenger and Todd Hughes was issued without an accompanying opinion.
Judges at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit appeared skeptical that antidumping duty petitioner Ad Hoc Shrimp Trade Action Committee could overcome the Court of International Trade's discretionary finding that the petitioner failed to adequately argue that third country sales must be "for consumption" in the third country market when determining normal value (Z.A. Sea Foods v. United States, Fed. Cir. # 23-1469).
The following lawsuit was recently filed at the Court of International Trade:
CBP continued to find that three importers evaded the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on hardwood plywood from China on remand at the Court of International Trade, after providing the companies with access to the confidential information in the Enforce and Protect Act proceeding (American Pacific Plywood v. U.S., CIT # 20-03914).
A hardwood plywood importer sought dismissal of its case in the Court of International Trade after winning a similar one April 8 (Liberty Woods International Inc. v. U.S., CIT # 20-00143).
CBP continued to find on remand that importer Skyview Cabinet USA evaded the antidumping and countervailing duty orders on wooden cabinets and vanities from China. After having the case returned to the agency following the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit's decision in Royal Brush Manufacturing v. U.S., CBP allowed Skyview to submit rebuttal factual information to confidential information it didn't originally have access to, though it ultimately came to the same conclusion (Skyview Cabinet USA v. United States, CIT # 22-00080).
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